Symphonic Metal Nights Tour! – Oh yeah, the name says it all!

The fantastic line-up consisting of JADED STAR, SERENITY and XANDRIA is a warranty for first-class, bombastic metal. In the context of the tour, the bands drive through Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Italy, France, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, Czech Republic and Belgium. This evening they stop in the club Matrix to rock Bochum in Germany. But first of all, there are some calmer tones. At the Meet and Greet, 20 lucky people enjoy an acoustic set by XANDRIA and SERENITY. In this private atmosphere Georg’s and Dianne’s voices enchant the small audience, accompanied by superb guitar riffs from Philipp and Christian respectively. Patient and courteous, all band members get ready for a little photo shoot with the fans and don’t shy away from contact with them. What a great experience for all present!

One hour later: The Matrix is ready to rock! The venue starts to fill up, as JADED STAR enters the stage. With her strong and characteristic voice, Maxi Nil elates the audience and the band starts the evening with songs from their long player “Memories from the Future”. Less symphonically bombastic, more metal! Sadly, the venue’s acoustics isn’t very good at the Matrix. Nonetheless it’s a great start in the night. Let’s see what’s coming next.

Co-headliner SERENITY is up: the guys form Austria shine through their excellent stage presence. The set list goes through their latest four albums, so everyone who ever listened to them remembers the familiar melodies. With their guest singer Tasha, they’ve found a reasonable replacement to their former co-fronter Clémentine Delauney. Tasha and Georg start sometimes an enthusiastic singing-battle and everyone visibly has lots of fun on stage, as does the public. What passionate musicians! Chris shows his skills on guitar and Fabio isn’t just a great bass player, but an excellent singer. He can reach such high notes – it’s just surprising!

After these 70 minutes of fun a dame of darkness appears on stage: It’s Dianne van Giersbergen from XANDRIA. Wearing a sparkling black dress and a skull crown that she probably made herself, she reminds us of an ancient idol (and the Statue of Liberty at the same time). In the middle of the bunker-like venue there is the mixing desk with a female sound technician at it – maybe we haven’t been paying attention enough, but spotting a soundwoman doesn’t seem like an everyday thing (#girlpower).

XANDRIA have a blast on stage and get a lot of applause and energy from the crowd. Their playlist is a little heavy on the new album, but most of the new songs are already known among the singing audience and their hits are of course even more celebrated. Some of the highlights certainly are ‘Sacrificium’ from the band’s latest album and ‘Forevermore’ from the one before.

With (the latter) two out of 5 bands in common, this tour reminds us of 2010’s Out Of The Dark Tour that also featured Amberian Dawn, Tristania and Van Canto. So, if you happened to miss that one or want to repeat it, you can catch these three excellent bands on their remaining shows together:

16/02 Masters of Rock Cafe – Zlin – CZ

17/02 Szene – Wien – AT

18/02 Rock it – Aalen – DE

19/02 Live-Club – Bamberg – DE

20/02 Kammgarn – Kaiserslautern – DE

21/02 Biebob – Vosselaar – BE

Pictures courtesy of the cool guys at metal-heads.de! German speakers among you should check out their concert report with lots of more pics.